Problem 16 a) Here we have a window size of N=3.

Suppose the receiver has received packet k-1, and has ACKed that and all other preceeding packets. If all of these ACK's have been received by sender, then sender's window is [k, k+N-1]. Suppose next that none of the ACKs have been received at the sender. In this second case, the sender's window contains k-1 and the N packets up to and including k-1. The sender's window is thus [k-N,k-1]. By these arguments, the senders window is of size 3 and begins somewhere in the range [k-N,k].

b) If the receiver is waiting for packet k, then it has received (and ACKed) packet k-1 and the N-1 packets before that. If none of those N ACKs have been yet received by the sender, then ACK messages with values of [k-N,k-1] may still be propagating back. Because the sender has sent packets [k-N, k-1], it must be the case that the sender has already received an ACK for k-N-1. Once the receiver has sent an ACK for k-N-1 it will never send an ACK that is less that k-N-1. Thus the range of in-flight ACK values can range from k-N-1 to k-1.

Problem 17 Because the A-to-B channel can lose request messages, A will need to timeout and retransmit its request messages (to be able to recover from loss). Because the channel delays are variable and unknown, it is possible that A will send duplicate requests (i.e., resend a request message that has already been received by B). To be able to detect duplicate request messages, the protocol will use sequence numbers. A 1-bit sequence number will suffice for a stop-and-wait type of request/response protocol. A (the requestor) has 4 states: Wait for Request 0 from above. Here the requestor is waiting for a call from above to request a unit of data. When it receives a request from above, it sends a request message, R0, to B, starts a timer and makes a transition to the Wait for D0 state. When in the Wait for Request 0 from above state, A ignores anything it receives from B.

Wait for D0. Here the requestor is waiting for a D0 data message from B. A timer is always running in this state. If the timer expires, A sends another R0 message, restarts the timer and remains in this state. If a D0 message is received from B, A stops the time and transits to the Wait for Request 1 from above state. If A receives a D1 data message while in this state, it is ignored.

Wait for Request 1 from above. Here the requestor is again waiting for a call from above to request a unit of data. When it receives a request from above, it sends a request message, R1, to B, starts a timer and makes a transition to the Wait for D1 state. When in the Wait for Request 1 from above state, A ignores anything it receives from B.

Wait for D1. Here the requestor is waiting for a D1 data message from B. A timer is always running in this state. If the timer expires, A sends another R1 message, restarts the timer and remains in this state. If a D1 message is received from B, A stops the timer and transits to the Wait for Request 0 from above state. If A receives a D0 data message while in this state, it is ignored.

The data supplier (B) has only two states:

Send D0. In this state, B continues to respond to received R0 messages by sending D0, and then remaining in this state. If B receives a R1 message, then it knows its D0 message has been received correctly. It thus discards this D0 data (since it has been received at the other side) and then transits to the Send D1 state, where it will use D1 to send the next requested piece of data.

Send D1. In this state, B continues to respond to received R1 messages by sending D1, and then remaining in this state. If B receives a R1 message, then it knows its D1 message has been received correctly and thus transits to the Send D1 state.